He Could Make Him Worse Than Ever
by Very Special Lee
Summary: John does not have to use his imagination for thinking what his last words would be.


**He Could Him Make Worse Than Ever**

The arch-enemy of his flatmate had been quite correct: Running with Sherlock Holmes was like seeing the battlefield. It was intriguing that battlefield did not necessarily meant dust, heat, sun, bombs and fire. The essential thing was the feeling of danger it sends down your spine, the pleasure of its thrill and the knowledge the unpredictable might happen any moment.

And even after less than twenty-four hours with Sherlock John knew that he would kill for this brilliant man if he had to, it was the feeling of belonging and of the beginning of a long wonderfully bizarre friendship that made John stay and caused him to run after cabs over roof tops and through dark, narrowed alleyways and to get from the other side of London to 221B just to send a text to a murderer.  
„If you were dying, if you were murdered, in the very last seconds, what would you say?" asked Sherlock and his grey eyes were piercing down to the bottom of John's soul.  
"Please God, let me live," said John hesitatingly, reciting these words from his memory. He could feel the gazes of the police officers in his back but did not move.  
Normal people would probably think of their beloved ones in their last moments but not so John. Even before he returned invalided home from Afghanistan he had felt lonely. John's sister had never agreed with him joining the Army and they had never had a close relation either- they lived their lives on their own, never interfering with the others.  
As a doctor he had held the hands of his friends or of unknown soldiers as their lives slipped away under their hands. He had heard their last words, their prayers, their confessions of love and had told them things were going to be alright, that they would soon be united with their families again. He had purposely lied to them.  
No one, perhaps not even other soldiers who were his family, his brothers and sisters, could relate to what he had seen. To the pain and the angst, the knowledge a young man died far away from home and there was absolutely nothing he could do to prevent it from happening.  
Being a doctor John had of course instantly realised that he was most likely going to die as it wasn't particularly healthy to lose more than forty percent of the body blood. It was life-threatening, in fact.  
He had no one to think of and though he was not very religious he asked God to let him stay alive, because the man whose wounds he had been treating was by all odds still alive and he had to assure him to stay alive because that's what a doctor is supposed to- to save lives and not to take them.  
"Use your imagination," Sherlock almost snapped like he was on the impression John's choice of words had been meant as a joke or the result of being uncreative.  
"I don't have to," replied John sincere.

And of course Sherlock observed that the wound he had been sent home for had been live-threatening and traumatic, not just in the sense of being utterly painful and violent but emotionally traumatising.

John was convinced that he would sleep fine this night although he had shot the cabbie.  
It was when Sherlock dived under the yellow barrier and threw the orange ambulance blanket through the opened window of a police car that John realised Sherlock probably knew it was him who had shot through the window to save his life.  
"Good shot," he said quietly and John felt that he did not bother him knowing. He actually was flattered.  
"Yes. Yes, must have been. Through that window," John replied nevertheless, avoiding Sherlock's eyes in which he could see mild interest.  
"Well, you'd know."  
They shared a look and John could see no aversion or not understanding. Good. His flatmate was acclimatised to violence too, if it had not been made obvious before. Two people longing for the thrill of danger to their lives- they would make such a good couple as in partners, uh, colleagues and maybe even friends.  
"Need to get the powder burns out of your fingers," said Sherlock. "I don't suppose you'd serve time for this, but let's avoid the court case."  
John cleared his throat. He was lucky and glad not to be on the wrong side with Sherlock. Instinctively he looked back over his shoulder just to make certain no one heard that.  
"Are you alright?" Sherlock asked and somehow John was baffled that a self-claimed high-functioning sociopath would care about his well-being.  
"Yes, of course I'm alright," said John.  
"You have just killed a man," Sherlock insisted still in a quiet voice.  
"Yes, I..." Being a soldier John had to kill before and knew from experience that it was better to kill than to hesitate and to be at the gunpoint of his opponent. It had not been self-defence; though in a sense it had been he assumed. During the last hours John had felt more alive than he had in months or even years. The way Sherlock glanced at him made him slightly uncomfortable, but he wouldn't be a soldier if he would show any signs of it. "That's true."  
He forced himself to smile. "But he wasn't a very nice man."  
"No. No, he wasn't, really, was he?"  
"And frankly, a bloody awful cabbie," said John and a chuckle escaped Sherlock's lips.  
"That's true he was a bad cabbie," Sherlock joined his attempt to change the subject because, really, John did not want to speak about that. "You should have seen the route he took us to get here."  
At that they both couldn't hold onto themselves and started giggling. It was, to his defence, John who got hold of himself first. "Stop! We can't giggle, it's a crime scene. Stop it."  
"You're the one who shot him," Sherlock said defiantly as they passed Sergeant Donovan.

_You're the one who shot him. _And John would do it all over again if he had to.

It was four o'clock in the morning when John finally fell asleep (someone must have moved his furniture into 221B while he and Sherlock had been at the Chinese on the end of Baker Street). He woke with a jolt and stared at the ceiling panting for breath. His t-shirt felt damp and rubbed his eyes with his hands.  
From downstairs he could hear Sherlock playing the violin. A smile flashed over his sweaty face and John placed the gun back under his pillow; and to the soothing melody of Sebastian Bach John's eyes fell, though he tried to fight his tiredness, close.

Everything was going to be fine.


End file.
